


Little Cogs for Big Machines

by completetheory



Category: Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodlines (Video Game)
Genre: Drug Use (Mentioned), Gen, Unethical bloodbond (mentioned)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-08
Updated: 2020-05-08
Packaged: 2021-03-02 19:27:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,476
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24082048
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/completetheory/pseuds/completetheory
Summary: Strauss isn't fond of the Anarchs, or walking Masquerade violations... Or wastefulness. In fact, he's become convinced that he's quite a resourceful man.
Comments: 4
Kudos: 16





	Little Cogs for Big Machines

**Author's Note:**

  * For [MadScientific](https://archiveofourown.org/users/MadScientific/gifts).



Little was known about Maximilian Strauss, and that was exactly how the Tremere Primogen preferred matters. When he'd volunteered for the LA 'assignment', he had enjoyed a peculiar kind of naiveté for his age about the relative level of difficulty.

He brought no servants (well, only one, and that one unannounced and fled rather awkwardly), nor did he 'recruit' locally. He expected suspicion, and he was not disappointed. LaCroix, the very individual his superiors had urged him to watch closely, was easily the most receptive of the whole group, and shockingly, one of the eldest. The Nosferatu and Malkavian Primogen were, to put the matter lightly, complete assholes. They were also barely 90, from what Strauss could determine, and he found that difficult to swallow. Every Primogen get-together felt as though he was a moment from reprimanding a gaggle of sullen, sneering teenagers. 

And LaCroix was far too lenient with them, in his opinion. Them and the Anarchs, both. He didn't much appreciate the Prince's age, either, but at least she had some semblance of decorum. 

That aside, outside mandatory meetings, Strauss socialized just enough to not seem a complete hermit (or more importantly, to remain vitally inside the loop), and thanked all manner of coincidences that he was Tremere and therefore expected to be unfriendly.

He made his way to Confession, feeling it was best if he didn't attract too much attention to the Chantry, and nodded amiably to the hostess. He drank nothing for himself, but to keep in the good graces of the club's owner, bought a few drinks at random. One of these mortals apparently interpreted the gesture as a solicitation, despite that he was waiting for someone else. She came over, all snub and 'uppity', the attitude belied by curious bright eyes. 

"Say, thanks for the drink. You look like the kind of guy who'd be ordering something a little more red, if you know what I mean."

Mildly alarmed, Strauss beckoned her closer while keeping an eye on the hostess. The young one practically climbed into his lap, sporting that affectionate blood drunk attitude characteristic to ghouls, but the glittering of her eyes was closer to withdrawal than inebriation.

"I do enjoy that sort," he assured her, wrapping an arm around her in sober imitation of a successful seduction, for the benefit of witnesses. He had no particular hunger. "What is your name?"

"I'm Patty. And I'm looking for someone."

Suspecting this would get ugly quickly, Strauss took her upstairs to one of the catwalks, rather than continuing to engage at a crowded bar. Up close and private, he could more easily see advanced states of withdrawal. With little prompting she elaborated that she was interested in locating one Kent Alan Ryan, a Toreador - he shushed her carefully when she grew emotional about how long it had been - she wasn't merely suffering withdrawal, she was addicted. 

Whether it was done purposefully or through carelessness, (as most ghouls could sustain themselves without trouble for a month in between feeding), this one was trembling, seemed anxious and irritable, cloudy-headed after mere days. Strauss did not - as a rule - involve himself in charity cases, but this was different. This was an issue of the Camarilla, and likely a careless Anarch's endangerment of same. If left to her own devices, the Anarch response would be the same, ultimately, as LaCroix's. Execution. 

"Come with me."

"You know where he is?" She followed, undominated, desperation in her tone.

"I will solve your difficulty." He said, and brought her back to the Chantry. He took a sample of her blood, ran a quick chemical analysis - as he had suspected, this Kent Ryan's blood was swimming with narcotics that he had passed along to her. 

Strauss was several minutes preparing a tincture to cleanse her blood, and she fidgeted on the couch in the living room. When he arrived, she took it gladly, but resisted drinking it once the initial sip had registered.

"This is disgusting! Are you trying to poison me?" 

"Drink it, and the burning in your veins will cease."

"Tastes like castor oil." She mumbled, but obediently drank, a gulp, a groan, and then, between two more gulps, "And then, you'll help me find Kent?"

"If you still wish to."

Once the poisons of varying type had cleared from her veins, she looked up at him slyly. "I guess I owe you now."

A small creature's attempt at seduction rather than gratitude, or perhaps she'd been instructed on the finer points of 'obedience' to Kent... In either case, Maximilian waved it off. "Nonsense. I merely do a public service for all Kindred. Your master failed to impress on you the need to be secretive. If the other Anarchs discover you are so free with your tongue, they will do worse than cut it free from your throat. Do you understand?"

From the look on her face, she had not been impressed upon with the extreme response she might incur, and she looked distressed, "--What did you say your name was?"

"Maximilian."

"And you're a blood witch?"

Strauss somewhat rolled his eyes, arresting the motion last minute. "Why not."

"Well, Max. Thanks for the magic brew, but I haven't been this sober since I was six years old, and I hate it."

Patty's unexpected comment startled a chuckle from Strauss. "You cannot make good decisions without clear judgment."

Patty may not have been able to make good decisions even with clear judgment, at this point. "I should go to the Last Round. You know. Talk to them. Straighten this thing out."

"I would not advise it." Strauss had no end of contempt for the childishness of the Anarch cause, if not the kindred themselves. 

"Yeah. Well, you're not my dad. And I don't know about - nobody ever mentioned being killed for talking about this."

Strauss was quiet, watching her, studying her reactions with interest. He decided, "If I were your father, I would have instilled a better survival instinct in you. I doubt they considered your life important enough to keep you properly informed."

"I am important! Kent said so. He said he couldn't do anything without me."

Not all Toreador took out their selfish desire to be human on humans by making them pawns in their games, Strauss knew. Just like not all Gangrel ran around naked in the forests at night. And to Strauss' alarm, he saw that she was looking tearful, overemotional. The first time in some time she wasn't combating a chemical cloud mentally and she had decided this situation was too overwhelming to approach.

Strauss observed her for a moment longer, knowing too well how certain death faced her outside his Chantry, and how the Anarchs might justify their carelessness, in reasoning that she would not be missed. For centuries he had hardened his heart against the kine, but he was also quite alone, and there would be no repercussions for 'looking weak', to his superiors in the Pyramid, should he choose to tell them about her at all. 

He considered carefully his offer, knowing _also_ that he would be bound to a series of responsibilities far greater than simply detoxing a ghoul, and that he would be a poor example indeed if he withdrew it. There would be no need to Sire her if she was a poor fit. And she would be no worse off, at least compared to how the Last Round would handle their little Masquerade risk. 

He smiled at her. "Patricia, how would you like to learn 'magic'...?" 

"Wait-... You mean you're not gonna kill me?" The tears she was wiping had smudged her makeup - she was all of 18 if she was a day, and Strauss again remarked to himself that this was purely a situation of utility. He felt no protectiveness toward or about her, although he could see through her various masks and acts quite easily to the misery underneath.

"Not even if you say 'no'." Strauss knew consent, willingness to learn, were the lifeblood of Tremere ideology initially. Those who were recalcitrant, sired without their knowledge or approval, ended up only as useless servants, often more trouble than they were worth and a constant source of potential information leakage. Even if they couldn't read the ancient texts themselves, smuggling out a page or two to get revenge on a cruel master was not unheard of.

This compassion was utterly practical. 

Patty blew her nose on her sleeve, somewhat off balance, but as keen as she would ever be to understand the world she had been thrust into. She had been a Toreador's lapdog, a trinket. She did deserve more than an ignoble death for a lack of comprehension, but Strauss could not make someone else adopt her, either.

She tried a small smile, unfamiliar to her in its sincerity, and said, "Okay."


End file.
